


The Gambles of Life

by Blue_Quill_Stories



Category: Enderal (Video Game)
Genre: Abuse, Adventure, F/M, Fighters, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Magic, Magic-Users, Myrids, Undead
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-21
Updated: 2018-08-20
Packaged: 2019-06-30 09:56:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15749349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blue_Quill_Stories/pseuds/Blue_Quill_Stories
Summary: Fate has a strange way of bringing people together, especially two people who have spent their whole life gambling against danger and death. Both Jespar and Diovella had no idea that fate would push them together, but a gamble is a gamble and there is no way to re-cast the dice now. Now with a storm amassing on the horizon, they have to work together and hope to the gods that they can win.Mallick and Calia were far from similar. His brash quick temper often clashing with her cool-headed composure, while his sister tried unsuccessfully to make them get along. Now they have to put their differences aside if they are to have any hope of fighting the storm beside Diovella and Jespar.





	The Gambles of Life

**Author's Note:**

> This is a Work in Progress and I will be updating as soon as I finish a chapter. I apologize in advance for how sporadic the updates will be, but please bear with me.  
> This is a prologue for another story mine and it tends to jump around the game's timeline a bit, to avoid most game spoilers. I plan to be working on Jespar and Diovella's story first, because their's take place first in the story's timeline.

Jespar placed down his glass and stretched his tense shoulders. Diovella has retired to her room not long ago, leaving him to continue observing the rest of the inn patrons. He had to admit that the idea of decent sleep was now more appealing then the well endowed women that he had had his eyes on earlier. A warm bath and a full nights rest would be a nice change of pace; especially considering the day's events. When one of the pretty barmaids came by, he cast a flirtatious wink at her as she took his glass. She blushed and quickly moved on to see to the other patrons, trying to look as normal as possible. He chuckled as he left the table to make his way upstairs. Now that he thought about it, in the month that they had worked together he had never seen her blush once. Despite any embarrassing things that had happened or something he had said. While Dio was adamant about paying him back, she rarely showed many emotions beyond sarcasm and gentle smiles. She had no issues complimenting his appearance, but had a hard time accepting ones directed at her. This woman was quite an interesting find; she seemed to enjoy traveling and always thought her way out of impossible odds at times. Believing that brains beat brawn any day, but accepting when brawn was needed to finish a job as a last resort. She almost seemed too perfect, as if she wasn't human... but that was ridiculous, she was human just like everyone else. Now that he thought about it, even for a woman, she knew how to hold her own with him, yet it almost seemed as if she was missing something feminine from her being at times. Not that he was complaining, truly. It was nice to have someone to casually talk to about whatever crossed his mind without any prejudice or judgmental stares. She was also more than willing to throw as much sarcasm at him, as he did with her and it was very refreshing. In a way, it guaranteed that the day would never be boring around her. Suddenly her smile became quite focused in his thoughts. At times it seemed as if the smile she showed him was different from what she directed at everyone else, but that was impossible. She always made comments about how attractive he was and seemed to flirt with him, but every time he said he wasn’t interested she always laughed and would say that she never meant it. That always seemed to get him laughing and it quickly became her way of breaking the ice whenever the air was tense around them. Unfortunately for him, it wasn’t hard to get lost in thought while gazing into her violet eyes. Whenever they sat down to talk, he found that he could never tear his eyes away from hers, imagining how they would look with different emotions, how they reacted to the magic she wielded so freely, and how they looked in the gathering dusk as the sun vanished in the tree line… shit. He was not supposed to be thinking about her like this, she was a wonderful person to travel with and he had already said that he wasn’t interested in her. So what was his problem? Shaking the thoughts from his head, he looked at his surroundings. He was at the end of the hall, where his and Diovella's rooms were. Wait, which one was his again? Damn it! She had told him at dinner which room he had, but he was so caught up in looking at the attractive women around the inn that he had completely forgotten which one. He had done this to her last time too. Walking into her room, a little tipsy, with a girl in his arms and the look on Diovella’s face when the door was thrown open… was not what he had expected. As soon as he had seen her on her bed reading a book, the first thought that went through his mind nearly sobered him up on the spot. Her asking the girl to leave before she would hurl one of her typical ice bolts at him was what he had expected her to do. However, instead she just sighed as she closed her book and grabbed her bag, still unpacked, and left the room with a simple “the room is all yours” as the door closed behind her. The next morning had been a fluster of embarrassment on his part, but she had said that she was not mad at him by any means. She had already said long ago that she didn’t care that he slept around and did what he wanted; all that she had asked him was that he respected her space. She also believed in never judging others, because no one ever truly knew what went on in every living being’s minds, which had made the atmosphere at breakfast that morning a bit more relaxed for the both of them. Shaking his head, he focused himself back on the present situation. Now... which one was it? He had remembered that their rooms were at the end of the hall, across from each other, but he was still seemed to be drawing a blank. Maybe if he tried to logic this through... hm... She always seemed to take the rooms on the right, so that would mean that the room on the left was his… right? Deciding to test his logic, he tentatively turned the door knob and quietly pushed on the door. Peaking through the cracked door, he did not see anyone and the room had a faint light in it. Used to her doing that for him before, he started through the doorway, but stopped before he fully passed the door at the sight of Dio. Her back was to him, but what had caught his attention more was that she was in her undergarments. She must have just finished her bath, on the account that she was in the middle of drying her hair and her skin was slightly wet; but she hadn’t seemed to have noticed him in the doorway just yet. But for the life of him he couldn’t tear his eyes off her form. Normally her clothes were loose and never revealed any of her figure, aside from her pants, but what he was seeing now was much more then what her clothes had ever scarcely revealed. She had a figure that he had only ever seen in goddess statues, in far distant countries, one that women all over desired to have. Yet, her chest seemed much smaller before, he would have remembered if her chest had been that big... so why was it…? Out of the corner of his eye he spotted some bandages wrapped on the end of the bed, they looked like they had recently been washed and were about halfway dried. Then it hit him. She must bind her chest so it looks smaller, but why? He decided to slip out before she saw him, but the sight of her moving to place her hair behind her temporarily made him freeze. Somehow wrenching his feet from where they had been locked, he barely managed to leave and quietly close the door behind him before quickly escaping into his room. Closing the door behind him, he heard her door open and close after a brief pause. Shit, she must have heard him. Yet she did not seem to come to his door, which maybe was a good thing. Before he could think about that any further, the image of her body came back to him in full force; causing him to quietly drop to the floor. Her olive-toned skin still a little wet from her bath, her voluptuous figure seemingly moving lightly as she dried her long, soft, hair, the sight of her ebony hair against her skin... shit. He could feel his body being worked up from the mental images his mind refused to abandon. Damn it, why did this have to happen? He began attempting to relieve himself; desperately he tried to imagine any of the women he had been with before. Maybe he could just charm one of the girls that were downstairs to join him, but the thought of another woman seemed like it would make his current situation worse for some unknown reason. However, she continued to dominate his thoughts as he kept going, with the image of her eyes, darkened by desire, finally being his undoing. As his head finally returned to normal, he noticed his pack had been placed next to his bed, with a pair of his clean clothes placed on the bedside table next to a small lit candle. Now that he had thought about it, this always happened whenever she traveled with him. No other time before her had he ever woken up to find his clothes washed, room clean, candles lit to cast minimal light, a fresh set of clothes laid out, and his weapons polished and sharpened. How in the world had she managed to do all of this without him noticing? Maybe he would ask her about it in the morning. Right now, it seemed like sleep was the only solution to his currently growing problem. After getting ready, he laid down on the bed and blew out the bedside candle. Hoping that dreams would be silent this once, however she came back to his thoughts once more and his body reacted in kind. *sigh* this was going to be a long night. 

The next morning, Jespar found it incredibly hard to get out of bed. He had tossed and turned all night and maybe got an hour or two of sleep. He knew he would have to face her this morning anyway, and she was more inclined to drag him along if he refused to get out of bed. Who knows, maybe she didn’t suspect him at all and if she did he would be honest about it, he had no reason not to. Well, not a reason that made sense anyways. Dragging himself out of bed and putting on the previously laid out clean set of clothes, he headed down stairs to grab something to clear his head and wake him up. Entering the downstairs, he spotted Dio sitting at a table off to the side. It looked like she had just gotten up herself. Her hair had been hastily braided and she appeared to be nursing her usual cup of spiced ginger tea. Ordering a glass of mild liquor from the bartender, he joined Dio at the table. As soon as he sat down, she raised an eyebrow in curiosity. “Rough night?” He took a sip from his glass before answering. “What makes you say that? I could have slept quite well and you just didn’t notice.” She rolled her eyes at his sarcastic response, a smirk faintly tugging at the corner of her mouth as she took a sip of her tea. “Well then… the ‘quick tumble in the hay’ look looks very good on you. You must give me some styling tips. I can never get my hair to look quite like that.” However his look was more confusion, then humor like she had expected. “What do you mean? This is how my hair normally looks.” Her expression was now a mixture of concern and a little bit of curiosity. “Blazes… Did you not look in a mirror this morning?” She left the table and headed towards the stairs. A few minutes pass before she returned with a small hand mirror, sitting down, she held it up so he could see his reflection. “Unless you just woke up after falling off a Myrid, I’m going to take a wild guess that you tossed and turned last night.” By the Wise Hermit… she was right. His hair was sticking out all over the place, and definitely gave off that ‘straight out of bed’ look. He tried running a hand through it, in an attempt to straighten it. Dio just shook her head at his efforts, though he was not sure if she was concerned or just trying not to laugh. “*sigh* Stay still.” She stood up slightly and reached across the table to run her fingers through his hair in an attempt to make it look half-way decent. He locked up as her hand continued to comb through his hair. It was soft… and gentle. He unconsciously closed his eyes at the sensation, it just felt so… comforting. Had he been 6 years old again, this might have put him to sleep. Just like when his mother did it to comfort him after a nightmare. It took all of his willpower to maintain consciousness until she finally removed her hand and sat back down. The feeling remained still, sending a miniscule bolt of lightning up his spine at the memory of how her hand felt, and the comforting feeling that it left behind. Now that he thought about it, had she always smelled like blackberry flowers? Ah, maybe it was just his imagination. There was no real reason as to why he would notice such a detail about her, which was not important. He tried to play it off, deciding it was better to forget the feeling her hand in his hair had left him with, and the images of last night all together. “Thank you, for helping me and your concern, I mean. But it was just another night of strange sleep, nothing to really be worried about.” She shook her head at response, before taking another sip of tea. “Okay. Well, I hope what you saw last night was not the cause of it.” Right on the mark again. Jespar's drink caught in his throat, causing him to start coughing in response to her comment. A couple of the other patrons cast curious glances at the both of them, before returning to their own meals. Once he was breathing normally he saw that she was wearing a smirk and he knew there was no hiding from her. “Ah! You have caught me, my dear woman. Though I must ask, how did you figure it out?” Dio let out a small, quiet, laugh. “You are the only person I know that is capable of moving that fast and that quietly. Most peeping toms’ you can hear from a mile way, just from their footfalls.” Before he could respond, one of the serving girls brought them a couple bowls of porridge and some fruit. She sat back, seemingly more relaxed as they began to eat. “I only hope my horrid appearance didn’t give you too many nightmares.” Jespar paused for a moment before continuing to eat. It was no secret that Diovella hated her appearance, going as far as referring to herself as ‘ugly,’ when in truth she was probably one of the best-looking women at the inns that they frequented during work. Normally a woman with her looks would bask in the praise and affection that men and women would shower them with. Dio, somehow, was the exact opposite; she never seemed to know what to do if someone complimented her appearance outside of work. During work she always suspected people of trying to get on her good side through empty flattery, with himself being the exception to that little quirk of hers. He had no problems speaking his mind in any situation and she seemed to welcome something different from the monotonous normality that surrounded them. Part of him wished that she would at least accept just the small compliments, but that was a very small part of him and she was a very stubborn woman, so pushing the subject was a mute argument for the both of them. But, that didn’t stop him from saying something every now and then. “Hardly; having a beautiful Nehrimese/Arazealean woman to look at while working, that does take the sting out of a lot.” He watched her reaction with anticipation, waiting for her quick retort. However, he got something else. She had been in the middle of drinking her tea when he had made his comment, causing her to inhale it on accident. It took a few moments of coughing for her to return to her normal composure. “Did I say something wrong? I thought I was being very honest.” Her eyes, which had been looking into his, now lowered and did not leave her bowl. She had a very faint pink coloring on her cheeks and she seemed to be thinking of a way to change the conversation quickly. It was rather... adorable? No, that wasn’t it. Endearing? That seemed more appropriate. He could not stop his smile from growing, the urge to tease her was too much for him to resist. “Could it be? I have rendered the infamous Diovella speechless?! Oh, now this occasion I have to celebrate.” Her response was throwing a piece of fruit at him; her eyes had a playful look to them now. “As if! It is way too early for talk like that. And where the heck did that come from anyway?” There was the Dio he knew and enjoyed working with. He laughed as he tossed a piece of fruit at her in response. After they had quelled their laughter, the conversation from there on out was relaxed and free of worry. The conversation soon turned to the job and what type of shenanigans they might get involved in, philosophy, ideals, and pretty much what ever came to mind. Pretty soon, he had forgotten the conversation from before and was eager to be on their way. As they grabbed their things and headed out the door, out of nowhere, Diovella punched him on the arm and he placed his hand on the injured area with a look of mock hurt, although his smirk gave him away. “Ow! What was that for?” She smiled as they continued walking out the door and down the road. “…That was for earlier.”


End file.
